Jericho
A street in Jericho
Arabic	أريحا
Name Meaning	Hebrew for "moon"
Founded in	9000 BC
Government	City (from 1994)
Also Spelled	Ariha (officially)
Governorate	Jericho
Population	20,400 (2006)
Jurisdiction	dunams
Head of Municipality	Hassan Saleh[1]

Jericho (Arabic أريحا (help·info), ʼArīḥā; Hebrew יְרִיחוֹ (help·info), Standard Yəriḥo Tiberian Yərîḫô / Yərîḥô; Greek Ἱεριχώ) is a town in the West Bank of the Palestinian territories, located within the Jericho Governorate, near the Jordan River. Arabic (ar الْعَرَبيّة (informally ar عَرَبيْ) in terms of the number of speakers is the largest living member of the Semitic language The following is a list of cities in Palestinian National Authority administrated areas, although depending on which particular area each locality is located After the signing of the Oslo Accords, the Palestinian territories were divided into three areas (Area A Area B and Area C and 16 Governorates under the jurisdiction The Jericho Governorate ( محافظة أريحا) is one of 16 Governorates of the Palestinian National Authority (administrative districts within the Palestinian A dunam or dönüm, dunum, donum is a unit of Area used in the Ottoman Empire and still used in various standardized versions Arabic (ar الْعَرَبيّة (informally ar عَرَبيْ) in terms of the number of speakers is the largest living member of the Semitic language Tiberian Hebrew is an extinct (yet very well documented Oral tradition of pronunciation for ancient Hebrew, especially the Hebrew of the Tanakh, that was Greek (el ελληνική γλώσσα or simply el ελληνικά — "Hellenic" is an Indo-European language, spoken today by 15-22 million people mainly The West Bank (الضفة الغربية, הגדה המערבית Hagadah Hamaaravit) also referred to in Israel as " Judea and Samaria Name There are differences of opinion as to what the Palestinian territories should be called The Jericho Governorate ( محافظة أريحا) is one of 16 Governorates of the Palestinian National Authority (administrative districts within the Palestinian This article is about the Jordan River and its valley in western Asia Its name may be derived from the word meaning "moon" in Hebrew and Canaanite, as the city was an early center of worship for lunar deities. ^[2] Despite the city's long history, Jericho was first mentioned in the Book of Numbers. The Book of Numbers, ( Bamidbar, meaning in the wilderness) is the fourth book of the Torah, the Tanakh, and the Old Testament.

Jericho is believed to be one of the oldest continuously-inhabited cities in the world,^[3] and archaeologists have unearthed the remains of over 20 successive settlements there, dating back to 11,000 years ago (9000 BC). ^[4]

Jericho has a population of approximately 25,000 Palestinians. Palestinian people or Palestinians ( الشعب الفلسطيني, ash-sha`b al-filasTīni; الفلسطينيون, al-filasTīnīyyūn ^[5] The current mayor is Hassan Saleh, a former lawyer. Three separate settlements have existed at or near the current location for more than 11,000 years. The position is on an east-west route north of the Dead Sea. The Dead Sea (יָם הַ‏‏מֶ‏ּ‏לַ‏ח, "Sea of Salt"البَحْر المَيّت, "Dead Sea" is a salt lake between

The first archaeological excavations of the site were made by Charles Warren in 1868. Archaeology, archeology, or archæology (from Greek grc ἀρχαιολογία archaiologia – grc ἀρχαῖος archaīos General Sir Charles Warren, GCMG, KCB, FRS ( 7 February 1840 &ndash 21 January 1927) was an officer in the Ernst Sellin and Carl Watzinger excavated Tell es-Sultan and Tulul Abu el-'Alayiq between 1907-1909 and in 1911 John Garstang excavated between 1930 and 1936. Ernst Sellin ( May 26 1867 in Altschwerin - January 1 1946 in Epichnellen bei Eisenach) was a German John Garstang ( May 5, 1876 &ndash September 12, 1956, Beirut) was a British archaeologist of the ancient Near East Extensive investigations using more modern techniques were made by Kathleen Kenyon between 1952 and 1958. Dame Kathleen Mary Kenyon ( 5 January, 1906 &ndash 24 August, 1978) was an important English Archaeologist of Neolithic Lorenzo Nigro and Nicolo Marchetti conducted a limited excavation in 1997. Later that same year, Dr. Bryant Wood also made a visit to the site to verify the findings of the earlier 1997 team. Bryant G Wood is a biblical archaeologist and Research Director of the inerrantist Associates for Biblical Research.

Archaeology

Tell es-Sultan

Hisham's Palace archaeological site just north of central Jericho

The earliest settlement was located at the present-day Tell es-Sultan (or Sultan's Hill), a couple of kilometers from the current city. Hisham's Palace ( Arabic Khirbat al-Mafjar) is the archaeological remains of an Umayyad winter palace located five km north of Jericho In Arabic and in Hebrew, tell means "mound" -- consecutive layers of habitation built up a mound over time, as is common for ancient settlements in the Middle East and Anatolia. Arabic (ar الْعَرَبيّة (informally ar عَرَبيْ) in terms of the number of speakers is the largest living member of the Semitic language Tell, tel or tall (تلّ tall, and תֵּל tel) meaning "hill" or "mound" is a type of archaeological The Middle East is a Subcontinent with no clear boundaries often used as a synonym to Near East, in opposition to Far East. Anatolia (Anadolu Ανατολία Anatolía) or Asia minor, comprising most of modern Turkey, is the geographic region bounded by the Black Jericho is the type site of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPN A) and B. In Archaeology a type site (also known as a type-site or typesite) is a site that is considered the model of a particular Archaeological The Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (short PPNA around 9000 BC represents the early Neolithic in the Levantine and upper Mesopotamian region of the Fertile

The habitation has been classed into several phases:

Natufian

Epipaleolithic — construction at the site apparently began before the invention of agriculture, with construction of stone of the Natufian culture structures beginning earlier than 9000 BC, virtually at the very beginning of the Holocene epoch in geologic history. The Epipaleolithic is a term used for the "final Upper Palaeolithic industries occurring at the end of the final glaciation which appear to merge technologically into the Agriculture refers to the production of goods through the growing of plants and fungi and the raising of domesticated Animals The study of agriculture The Natufian culture (natʏˈfjẽː existed in the Mediterranean region of the Levant. The Holocene is a Geological epoch which began approximately 10000 years ago (about 8000 BC

Greek Orthodox monastery overlooking modern Jericho.

PPN A

Pre-Pottery Neolithic A, 8350 BC to 7370 BC. The Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (short PPNA around 9000 BC represents the early Neolithic in the Levantine and upper Mesopotamian region of the Fertile Sometimes it is called Sultanian. The Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPNA wall of Jericho dates to approximately 8000 BC and is thought to be the first City wall ever built The site is a 40,000 square metre settlement surrounded by a stone wall, with a stone tower in the centre of one wall. The metre or meter is a unit of Length. It is the basic unit of Length in the Metric system and in the International The Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPNA wall of Jericho dates to approximately 8000 BC and is thought to be the first City wall ever built This is so far the oldest wall ever to be discovered, thus suggesting some kind of social organization. The town contained round mud-brick houses, yet no street planning. ^[6] The 2000-3000 dwellers^[7] (population weighed to the former value) used domesticated emmer wheat, barley and pulses and hunted wild animals. Emmer wheat ( Triticum dicoccon) also known as farro especially in Italy is a low yielding awned Wheat. Barley ( Hordeum vulgare) is an annual Cereal Grain, which serves as a major animal Feed crop, with smaller amounts used for Pulses are annual leguminous crops yielding from one to twelve Grains or Seeds of variable size shape and color within a Pod, according The true population of Jericho during the PPN A period is still under debate.

PPN B

Pre-Pottery Neolithic B, 7220 BC to 5850 BC (but carbon-14-dates are few and early). Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB is a division of the Neolithic developed by Dame Kathleen Kenyon during her Archaeological excavations at Jericho Carbon-14, 14C, or radiocarbon, is a Radioactive isotope of Carbon discovered on February 27, 1940, by Expanded range of domesticated plants. Possible domestication of sheep. Apparent cult involving the preservation of human skulls, with facial features reconstructed from plaster and eyes set with shells in some cases. This article discusses cult in the original and typically ancient sense of "religious practice" (cultus The term plaster can refer to plaster of Paris Lime plaster, or Cement plaster.

After the PPN A settlement-phase there was a settlement hiatus of several centuries, then the PPN B settlement was founded on the eroded surface of the tell. Tell, tel or tall (تلّ tall, and תֵּל tel) meaning "hill" or "mound" is a type of archaeological The architecture consisted of rectilinear buildings made of mudbricks on stone foundations. The mudbricks were loaf-shaped with deep thumb prints to facilitate bounding. No building has been excavated in its entirety. Normally, several rooms cluster around a central courtyard. There is one big room (6. 5 x 4 m and 7 x 3 m) with internal divisions, the rest are small, presumably used for storage. The rooms have red or pinkish terrazzo-floors made of lime. Terrazzo is a Faux - Marble flooring or Countertopping material Some impressions of mats made of reeds or rushes have been preserved. The courtyards have clay floors.

Kathleen Kenyon interpreted one building as a shrine. Dame Kathleen Mary Kenyon ( 5 January, 1906 &ndash 24 August, 1978) was an important English Archaeologist of Neolithic A shrine, from the Latin scrinium (‘box’ also used as a desk like the French bureau) was originally a container usually made of precious materials used It contained a niche in the wall. A chipped pillar of volcanic stone that was found nearby might have fit into this niche.

The dead were buried under the floors or in the rubble fill of abandoned buildings. There are several collective burials. Not all the skeletons are completely articulated, which may point to a time of exposure before burial. A skull cache contained seven skulls. The jaws were removed and the faces covered with plaster; cowries were used as eyes. Cowry, also sometimes spelled cowrie, plural always cowries, is the Common name for a group of small to large sea Snails marine A total of ten skulls were found. Modelled skulls were found in Tell Ramad and Beisamoun as well.

Other finds

• Flints: arrowheads (tanged or side-notched), finely denticulated sickle-blades, burins, scrapers, a few tranchet axes. Burin from the French burin meaning "cold Chisel " has two specialised meanings for types of tools in English one meaning a Steel In Archaeology, a tranchet flake is a characteristic type of flake removed by a Flintknapper during Lithic reduction. 1% obsidian, Ciftlik and green obsidian from unknown source.
• Ground stone: querns, hammerstones, a few ground-stone axes made of greenstone. Quern-stones are a pair of stone tools for hand Grinding a wide variety of materials Dishes and bowls carved from soft limestone. Spindle whorls made of stone and maybe loom weights.
• Bone Tools: Spatulae and drills
• Stylised anthropomorphic plaster figures, almost life-size
• Anthropomorphic and theriomorphic clay figurines
• Shell and malachite beads

Pottery Neolithic A and B

In the late 4th millennium BC, Jericho was occupied during Neolithic 2 and the general character of the remains on the site link it culturally with Neolithic 2 sites in the West Syrian and Middle Euphrates groups. Anthropomorphism is the attribution of uniquely Human characteristics to non-human creatures and beings natural and supernatural phenomena material states and objects Therianthropy (from n therianthrope and adj therianthropic, part man and part beast from the Greek theríon, θηρίον meaning "wild There are the characteristic rectilinear mud-brick buildings and plaster floors.

Bronze age

During the Middle Bronze Age Jericho was a small prominent city of the Kna'an region, reaching its greatest Bronze Age extent in the period from 1700 to 1550 BC. Canaanites redirects here For the 1940s social and political movement in Israel, see Canaanites (movement. It seems to have reflected the greater urbanization in the area at that time, and has been linked to the rise of the Maryannu, a class of chariot-using aristocrats linked to the rise of the Mitannite state to the north. Maryannu is an ancient word for the caste of Chariot -mounted hereditary warrior nobility which dominated many of the societies of the Middle East during the Bronze Mitanni ( Hittite cuneiform, also Mittani) or Hanigalbat ( Assyrian Hanigalbat Khanigalbat cuneiform) Kathleen Kenyon reported “. . . the Middle Bronze Age is perhaps the most prosperous in the whole history of Kna'an. . . . The defenses . . . belong to a fairly advanced date in that period” and there was “a massive stone revetment. . . part of a complex system” of defenses (pp. 213-218). ^[8]

Walls of Jericho

Main article: Battle of Jericho

The Biblical account of the destruction of Jericho is found in the Book of Joshua. The Battle of Jericho also known as the Siege of Jericho is described by the Book of Joshua, and is prominent among cultural references to the Bible. Etymology According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the word bible is from Latin biblia, traced from the same word through Medieval Latin and Late Latin The Battle of Jericho also known as the Siege of Jericho is described by the Book of Joshua, and is prominent among cultural references to the Bible. The Book of Joshua ( Hebrew: Sefer Y'hoshua ספר יהושע is the sixth book in both the Hebrew Tanakh and the Old Testament of the Christian The Bible describes the destruction as having proceeded from the actions of Joshua, Moses' successor. Joshua, Jehoshuah, or Yehoshua ( 'יְהוֹשֻׁעַ, Tiberian: jə The Exodus is usually dated to the 13th century BC (based on Ussherian calculation) − according to interpretation of archaeological evidence from the Merneptah Stele. The Exodus ( is the term used for the escape departure and emancipation of the enslaved Israelites freed from Ancient Egypt as described in the Hebrew James Ussher (sometimes spelled Usher) (4 January 1581–21 March 1656 was Anglican Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of All Ireland The Merneptah Stele (also known as the Israel Stele or Victory Stele of Merneptah) is the reverse of a large granite stele originally erected by the That was followed by new settlements in the next century. At that time the Pharaoh of Egypt would have been Ramses II. Alternatively, the exodus is dated to the 15th century BC according to a prevailing Christian reckoning of biblical chronology, which is synchronized with several ancient calendars with astronomical observation. At that time the Pharaoh would have been Thutmose III (1490-1430). Thutmose III (sometimes read as Thutmosis or Tuthmosis III and meaning Thoth is Born) was the sixth Pharaoh of the Eighteenth Neither biblical chronology matches the popular interpretation of the archaeological evidence at Jericho.

Joshua instructs his spies to "Go, view the Land, especially Jericho" לכו ראו את-הארץ ואת-יריחו(Joshua 2:1). Archaeologist Kathleen Kenyon commented that this order "is an illustration of the position of Jericho in the age-long process of penetration by nomads and seminomads from the desert area in the east into the fertile coastal lands," due to the town's position in the Jordan valley at the foot of a passage through the Judean hills to the west. Dame Kathleen Mary Kenyon ( 5 January, 1906 &ndash 24 August, 1978) was an important English Archaeologist of Neolithic

The Taking of Jericho, by Jean Fouquet

A destruction of Jericho's walls dates archaeologically to around 1550 BC in the 16th century BC at the end of the Middle Bronze Age, by a siege or an earthquake in the context of a burn layer, called City IV destruction. Jean Fouquet or Jehan Fouquet (1420 - 1481 was the most important French painter of the 15th century a master of both panel painting and manuscript Opinions differ as to whether they are the walls referred to in the Bible. According to one biblical chronology, the Israelites destroyed Jericho after its walls fell out around 1407 BC: the end of the 15th century. Originally, John Garstang's excavation in the 1930s dated Jericho's destruction to around 1400 BC, in confirmation, but like much early biblical archaeology, his work became criticised for using the Bible to interpret the evidence rather than letting the facts on the ground draw their own conclusions. John Garstang ( May 5, 1876 &ndash September 12, 1956, Beirut) was a British archaeologist of the ancient Near East For the movement associated with William F Albright and known as Biblical archaeology see Biblical archaeology school. Kathleen Kenyon's excavation in the 1950s redated it to around 1550 BC, a date that most archaeologists support. Dame Kathleen Mary Kenyon ( 5 January, 1906 &ndash 24 August, 1978) was an important English Archaeologist of Neolithic ^[9][10] In 1990, Bryant Wood critiqued Kenyon's work after her field notes became fully available. Bryant G Wood is a biblical archaeologist and Research Director of the inerrantist Associates for Biblical Research. Observing ambiguities and relying on the only available carbon dating of the burn layer, which yielded a date of 1410 BC plus or minus 40 years, Wood dated the destruction to this carbon dating, confirming Garstang and the biblical chronology. Unfortunately, this carbon date was itself the result of faulty calibration. In 1995, Hendrik J. Bruins and Johannes van der Plicht used high-precision radiocarbon dating for eighteen samples from Jericho, including six samples of charred cereal grains from the burn layer, and overall dated the destruction to an average 1562 BC add or subtract 38 years. ^[11][12][13] Kenyon's date of around 1550 BC is widely accepted based on this methodology of dating. Notably, many other Canaanite cities were destroyed around this time.

The widespread destructions of the 16th century BC are often linked with the expulsion of the Hyksos from Egypt around this time. The Hyksos ( Egyptian heqa khasewet, "foreign rulers" Greek,, Arabic,) were an Asiatic people who invaded the eastern Nile The 1st-century historian Josephus, in Against Apion, identified the Exodus of Israelites according to the Bible as the Expulsion of the Hyksos according to the Egyptian texts. Josephus (AD 37 – c 100 also known as Yosef Ben Matityahu (Joseph son of Matthias and after he became a Roman citizen, as Titus Flavius Josephus Against Apion (or Contra Apionem) was a polemical work written by Flavius Josephus as a defense of Judaism as a classical religion

A few scholars follow the controversial new chronology of David Rohl, which postulates that the entire mainstream Egyptian chronology is 300 years misplaced; with the consequence that, among other things, the exodus would be dated to the 16th or 17th century BC, and hence the archaeological record on Jericho would be much more aligned with the biblical account. The Glasgow Chronology or New Chronology is a proposed revision of the Egyptian chronology of Ancient Egypt. David M Rohl (born 12 September 1950) is a British Egyptologist and Historian who has put forth several controversial theories concerning Exodus ( Greek: έξοδος eksodos = "departure" is the second book of the Jewish Torah and of the Christian Old Testament. The archaeological record is a term used in Archaeology to denote all archaeological evidence, including the physical remains of past human activities which Archaeologists Despite this, a number of literalist Christians, most prominently the respected Egyptologist Kenneth Kitchen, have vehemently attacked Rohl's chronology, since it introduces a number of other problems and issues (such as identifying the biblical Shishak as Ramses II, rather than the far more obviously named Shoshenq). Kenneth Anderson Kitchen (born 1932 is Personal and Brunner Professor Emeritus of Egyptology and Honorary Research Fellow at the School of Archaeology, Classics and Shishak ( Hebrew: שישק Tiberian:) or Shishaq is the biblical Hebrew form of the first ancient Egyptian name of a Pharaoh mentioned Shoshenq (also commonly spelled Sheshonq, Sheshonk, Shoshenk) is the name given in English transliteration to a number of Egyptian Pharaohs

Tulul Abu el-'Alayiq

A later settlement spanned the Hellenistic, New Testament, and Islamic periods, leaving mounds located at Tulul Abu el-'Alayiq, 2 km west of modern Ariha. This article focuses on the cultural aspects of the Hellenistic age for the historical aspects see Hellenistic period. For other meanings including people named 'Islam' see Islam (disambiguation.

Synagogues

For more details on this topic, see Shalom Al Israel synagogue. The Shalom Al Israel synagogue ( Hebrew: שלום על ישראל is Jericho's ancient Synagogue.

For more details on this topic, see Na'aran synagogue.

An ancient synagogue was discovered in Jericho in 1936, named Shalom Al Israel, or "peace unto Israel", after the central Hebrew motto in its mosaic floor. It was controlled by Israel after the 1967 Six Day War, but after the handover to Palestinian Authority control per the Oslo Accords, and especially during the Al-Aqsa Intifada it has been a source of conflict, and it was partially destroyed by Palestinian forces during the latter. Background Suez Crisis aftermath The Suez Crisis of 1956 represented a military defeat but a political victory for Egypt Israeli-Palestinian conflict The Oslo Accords, officially called the Declaration of Principles on Interim Self-Government Arrangements or Declaration of Principles

The ancient Na'aran synagogue was discovered on the northern outskirts of Jericho in 1918. While less is known of it than Shalom Al Israel, it has a larger mosaic and is in similar condition.

Biblical references

Jericho is mentioned over 70 times in the Old Testament. In Western Christianity, the Old Testament refers to the books that form the first of the two-part Christian Biblical canon. Here are some examples:

• Prior to Moses' death, God is described as showing him the Promised Land in the Book of Deuteronomy with Jericho as a point of reference: "And Moses went up from the plains of Moab unto Mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, that is over against Jericho. Moses ( Latin: Moyses,; Greek: grc Mωυσής in both the Septuagint and the New Testament; Arabic: ar موسىٰ The Promised Land ( הארץ המובטחת, translit: ha-Aretz ha-Muvtachat) is another name for the Land of Israel, the region which according Deuteronomy (Greek deuteronomion, Δευτερονόμιον "second law" is the fifth book of the Hebrew Bible and of the Old Testament Moab (; Greek Μωάβ; Arabic مؤاب, Assyrian Mu'aba, Ma'ba, Ma'ab; Egyptian Mount Nebo is the name of Mount Nebo (Jordan, a mountain in western Jordan and the mountain where (according to the Bible the prophet Moses is believed to And the Lord showed him all the land, even Gilead as far as Dan". (Deuteronomy 34:1). The word "Jericho" also happens to be the final word in the entire Book of Numbers^[14]. The Book of Numbers, ( Bamidbar, meaning in the wilderness) is the fourth book of the Torah, the Tanakh, and the Old Testament.

The walls of Jericho crumble as the priest blows his horn in this illustration from a 14th century Icelandic manuscript. Iceland, officially the Republic of Iceland ( ( Ísland or Lýðveldið Ísland (

• The Book of Joshua describes the famous siege of Jericho, claiming that it was circled seven times by the ancient Children of Israel until its walls came tumbling down^[15], after which Joshua cursed the city: "And Joshua charged the people with an oath at that time, saying: 'Cursed be the man before the Lord that riseth up and buildeth this city, even Jericho; with the loss of his first-born shall he lay the foundation thereof, and with the loss of his youngest son shall he set up the gates of it'". The Book of Joshua ( Hebrew: Sefer Y'hoshua ספר יהושע is the sixth book in both the Hebrew Tanakh and the Old Testament of the Christian The Battle of Jericho also known as the Siege of Jericho is described by the Book of Joshua, and is prominent among cultural references to the Bible. Joshua, Jehoshuah, or Yehoshua ( 'יְהוֹשֻׁעַ, Tiberian: jə (Joshua 6:26). According to the First Book of Kings, centuries later, a man named Hiel of Bethel rebuilt Jericho- and just as Joshua had foretold, he lost his eldest and youngest sons as a result. The Books of Kings ( Sefer Melachim, ספר מלכים are a part of Judaism 's Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible. (1 Kings 16:34)
• The Book of Jeremiah describes the end of the Judean king Zedekiah when he is captured in the area of Jericho: "But the army of the Chaldeans pursued after them, and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho; and when they had taken him, they brought him up to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon to Riblah in the land of Hamath, and he gave judgment upon him. The Book of Jeremiah, or Jeremiah ( יִרְמְיָהוּ Yirməyāhū in Hebrew) is part of the Hebrew Bible, Judaism Tzidkiyahu (צִדְקִיָּהוּ Şidhqiyyāhû; Greek: ζεδεκιας Zedekias; traditional English Zedekiah) was the last king of Nebuchadrezzar II, more often called Nebuchadnezzar (c 630-562 BC was a ruler of Babylon in the Chaldean Dynasty, who reigned c " (Jeremiah 39:5).

Jericho is also mentioned several times in the New Testament books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and Hebrews. The Gospel of Matthew (Gk Κατά Ματθαίον Ευαγγέλιον is one of the four Canonical gospels in the New Testament and is a Synoptic gospel Content Authorship The gospel itself is anonymous but as early as Papias in the early 2nd century a text was attributed to Mark, a cousin The Gospel of Luke (Gk Κατά Λουκάν Ευαγγέλιον) is a synoptic Gospel, and is the third and longest of the four canonical Gospels of the The Epistle to the Hebrews (abbr Heb for Citations is one of the books in the New Testament. For example:

• According to Matthew 20:29-30, Jesus healed two blind men as he and his disciples were leaving Jericho. Jesus of Nazareth (7–2 BC / BCE —26–36 AD / CE)
• In Mark 10:46-52, Mark tells the same story, except he only mentions one of the men, Bartimaeus. Bartimaeus (more accurately Bar Timaeus, "Son of Timaeus" is the name given in the Gospel of Mark to a blind man healed by Jesus as
• Like Mark, Luke only mentions one man, but he differs in his account by saying that Jesus and his apostles were approaching Jericho. Some versions reconcile this by translating it as "near".
• In the Epistle to the Hebrews, the author mentions the Old Testament story of the destruction of Jericho as an outward display of faith. The Epistle to the Hebrews (abbr Heb for Citations is one of the books in the New Testament. In Western Christianity, the Old Testament refers to the books that form the first of the two-part Christian Biblical canon. (Hebrews 11:30)
• In the story of the Good Samaritan (the experience is not told by Jesus as a parable, but as a narrative; Luke 10:30), Jesus mentions that a certain man was on his way to Jericho.

Recent history

The present city was captured from Jordan by Israel during the Six-Day War of 1967 along with the rest of the West Bank. Jordan, officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan (الأردنّ al-Urdunn) is an Arab country in Southwest Asia spanning the southern For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Israel topics. Background Suez Crisis aftermath The Suez Crisis of 1956 represented a military defeat but a political victory for Egypt The West Bank (الضفة الغربية, הגדה המערבית Hagadah Hamaaravit) also referred to in Israel as " Judea and Samaria It was one of the first cities handed over to Palestinian Authority control in 1994, in accordance with the Oslo accords, which saw construction of the Oasis casino. Israeli-Palestinian conflict The Oslo Accords, officially called the Declaration of Principles on Interim Self-Government Arrangements or Declaration of Principles The other city handed over to the Palestinians was Gaza. Gaza (غزة, עַזָּה ʕazzā is the largest city in the Gaza Strip and the Palestinian territories. Jericho was re-occupied by Israel during the Al-Aqsa Intifada of 2001.

Jericho prison siege

On March 14, 2006, the Israel Defense Forces took captive six inmates from a Jericho prison following a 10-hour siege. Events 1489 - The Queen of Cyprus, Catherine Cornaro, sells her kingdom to Venice. Year 2006 ( MMVI) was a Common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. The Israel Defense Forces ( IDF) (צְבָא הַהֲגָנָה לְיִשְׂרָאֵל, lit Israel's reason for the siege was to capture PFLP general secretary, Ahmad Sa'adat and five other inmates for the alleged assassination of Israeli tourist minister Rehavam Zeevi because of announcements of their upcoming release. Ahmad Sa'adat (also transliterated from Arabic as Ahmed Sadat / Saadat, Arabic احمد سعدات(born 1954) is a Palestinian politician (רחבעם "גנדי" זאבי born 20 June 1926, died 17 October 2001) was an Israeli general Politician Both sides of the siege were armed and at least two people were killed and 35 wounded in the incident. Before the siege British and American monitors were guarding the prison but withdrew, citing lax security arrangements. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK or Britain,is a Sovereign state located The United States of America —commonly referred to as the The siege caused an uproar amongst the PFLP members and supporters as well as other PLO factions, and as a result Palestinian militants raided and kidnapped British and European citizens in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine ( PFLP) ( Arabic: الجبهة الشعبية لتحرير فلسطين al-Jabhah al-Sha`biyyah li-Tahrīr The Palestine Liberation Organization ( PLO) (منظمة التحرير الفلسطينية or Munazzamat al-Tahrir al-Filastiniyyah) is a political and paramilitary The West Bank (الضفة الغربية, הגדה המערבית Hagadah Hamaaravit) also referred to in Israel as " Judea and Samaria The Gaza Strip (قطاع غزة, רצועת עזה Retzu'at 'Azza) is a coastal strip of land along the Mediterranean Sea, bordering Egypt on the south-west The event is considered controversial and somewhat hampered Palestinian relations with the UK and US. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK or Britain,is a Sovereign state located The United States of America —commonly referred to as the ^[16]

Sister cities

• Pisa
• Lyon
• Calipatria

See also

• History of ancient Israel and Judah
• History of pottery in the Southern Levant
• Jericho Governorate
• Mevo'ot Yericho

References

• Kenyon, Kathleen (1957). Digging Up Jericho.  
• Finkelstein, Israel; Silberman, Neil Asher (2002). The Bible Unearthed. Touchstone. ISBN 0-684-86913-6.  
• Gates, Charles (2003). Ancient Cities: The Archaeology of Urban Life in the Ancient Near East and Egypt, Greece and Rome. .  

External links

• Telepherique & Sultan Tourist Center
• Jericho Municipality Official Website
• Resources on Biblical Archaeology
• Archaelogical History of Jericho
• Jericho: Tel es-Sultan
• The walls of Jericho fell in 1550 BCE